1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a lumen passability checking device inserted into an organ of a subject to check beforehand whether a capsule medical device inserted into the organ of the subject such as a patient can pass through inside of a lumen of the subject (that is, a lumen passability of a capsule medical device), a lumen passability checking method, and a method of manufacturing a lumen passability checking device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Capsule endoscopes having an imaging function and a radio communication function have been produced in the field of endoscope in recent years. A subject such as a patient ingests the capsule endoscope from his mouth to perform a capsule endoscope examination to observe (examine) the inside of an organ. After the patient ingests the capsule, the capsule endoscope moves within organs such as stomach and small intestine by a peristaltic movement or the like until when the capsule endoscope is naturally excreted from the subject. During this period, the capsule endoscope sequentially captures images within the organ of the subject (hereinafter, also referred to as “in-vivo images”) at 0.5-second intervals, for example, The capsule endoscope sequentially radio-transmits the captured in-vivo images to a receiving device carried by the subject.
The receiving device carried by the subject sequentially receives the in-vivo images that are radio-transmitted by the capsule endoscope, and sequentially accumulates the in-vivo images within a recording medium of the receiving device. Thereafter, the recording medium that stores an in-vivo image group of the subject is detached from the receiving device, and is attached to a predetermined image display device. The image display device acquires the in-vivo image group of the subject via the recording medium, and displays the in-vivo image group of the subject on a display. A doctor or nurse observes the in-vivo images displayed in the image display device, and performs a diagnosis of the subject.
When a stenosis part exists within an organ (within a lumen) of a subject, a capsule endoscope taken into the subject to perform the capsule endoscope examination tends to be stagnated at the stenosis part. Therefore, before performing the capsule endoscope examination on the subject, a doctor or nurse needs to check a passability of the capsule endoscope, to be taken into the subject, through a lumen. As a device that checks a passability of the capsule endoscope through the lumen (that is, lumen passability checking device), there has been a device formed by an external coating and an internal filling material, and when the device stagnates at a stenosis part within the lumen, the device collapses the external coating and discharges the internal filling material to the inside of the lumen, and marks (colors) the stenosis part by a marker included in the discharged internal filling material (see Published Japanese translation of a PCT application No. 2005-508668).